DEVELOPMENT OF SHORT-TERM MEMORY FOR SPEECH ATTRIBUTES

工作记忆（WM）可以被定义为可以在头脑中保存并操纵的信息量，以便完成心理任务，如理解，解决问题或连续回忆。工作记忆通常是用需要同时存储和处理信息的任务来衡量的。过去的研究表明，在WM的个体和发展差异是很重要的，这样复杂的认知任务，但它还不清楚是什么基本过程的WM措施和他们的发展变化。这个修订后的竞争性延续提案采用了我们最近设计的方法，以观察从6岁到成年期间几个基本处理参数的发育变化：最近呈现信息的短期记忆重审率、加快的清晰度;自动保存的信息的持续性，例如感觉记忆;以及STM的能力，用不相关的信息块来衡量。对这些参数的发展变化的观察是重要的，因为许多研究人员认为，这些基本参数（类似于计算机硬件）中的大多数保持不变，主要是知识和策略（类似于计算机软件）随着儿童的发展而变化。计划中的研究不仅仅是为基本参数的发展变化积累进一步的支持，还有其他三个具体目标。(1)第一个目的是了解信息处理系统中基本参数的作用机制。例如，一项研究检查了容量限制是否如预期的那样是注意力集中的中心限制，或者相反是特定于模态的商店中的容量限制（例如，听觉/语言和视觉/空间刺激的单独容量限制）。(2)第二个目的是了解基本参数如何相互影响。例如，一项研究通过在提取率的测量过程中施加记忆负荷，考察了重审率的发展变化是否可能是容量限制变化的间接后果。(3)第三个目标是了解基本参数如何与信息处理能力的更复杂的衡量标准以及彼此之间的关系。这将在相对较大的相关性研究中进行调查，并采用包含基本参数、复杂和简单记忆广度以及能力倾向和学业成绩测量的模型。这一理论上的进步也应该有助于理解各种学习和语言障碍，这些障碍的特点是记忆广度差，理论上的原因需要澄清。

Working memory (WM) can be defined as the amount of information that can be held in the mind and manipulated in order to allow the completion of a mental task such as comprehension, problem-solving, or serial recall. WM often is measured with tasks that require the storage and processing of information at the same tome. Past research shows that individual and developmental differences in WM are important for such complex cognitive tasks, but it is not yet clear what basic processes underlie WM measures and their developmental change. This revised competing continuation proposal adapts methods that we have devised recently to observe developmental changes in serval basic processing parameters, from age 6 to adulthood: the short-term memory retrial rate for recently presented information, speeded articulation rates; the persistence of automatically held information, such as sensory memory; and the capacity of S.T.M., measured in unrelated chunks of information. The observations of developmental changes in these parameters are important because many researchers have suggested that most of these basic parameters (analogous to computer hardware) stay fixed, and that is primarily knowledge and strategies (analogous to computer software) that change with development in childhood. Rather than just accumulating further support for developmental changes in the basic parameters, the planned research has three other specific aims. (1) The first aim is to understand the mechanisms of the basic parameters within information processing system. For example, one study examines whether the capacity limits are central limits in the attentional focus as expected, or instead are capacity limits in modality-specific stores ( e.g., separate capacity limits for auditory/verbal and visual/spatial stimuli). (2) the second aim is to learn how the basic parameters influence one another. For example, one study examines whether the developmental change in retrial rates could be an indirect consequence of the change in capacity limits, by imposing a memory load during the measure of retrieval rates. (3) The third aim is to learn how the basic parameters are related to more complex measures of information processing ability, as well as to one another. This will be investigated in relatively large correlational study and with models incorporating the basic parameters, complex as well as simple memory spans, and measures of aptitude and scholastic achievement. This theoretical advance also should help in understanding various learning and language disorders, which are known to be marked by poor memory span for theoretical reasons that need clarification.